Book 12+ weeks ahead for the cheapest fares

Most people know if you book early, you can get cheaper train tickets, yet often these vanish quicker than empty seats on a peak-time commuter journey. To ensure a bargain, the key is to start looking for tickets about 12 weeks before.

Contractually Network Rail must - usually - have the timetable set 12 weeks in advance. So train operators commonly release cheap advance tickets shortly after. It's not always dead on 12 weeks though, often more like 10 or 11.

On the other hand, some train companies now release advance tickets even earlier than 12 weeks prior – with the caveat that times could change slightly. For example, London North Eastern Railway often releases advance tickets 24 weeks ahead for routes from stations north of York into London.

It's also worth knowing that, with some rail firms, you can buy cheap advance tickets up to 10 minutes before you travel if they haven't sold out. For full help, see Book early, late.

Get a free alert when tickets go on sale

If you know when and where you want to go, there's a sneaky way to be first in the cheap tickets queue. Put your journey details into the Trainline's ticket alert system and you'll get an email when advance tickets for that specific journey go on sale, which are commonly the cheapest fares.

DON'T buy tickets via the Trainline though, as you could pay from £2.75 extra in booking and delivery fees, whereas you can avoid these charges by booking through the likes of LNER and Skyscanner. See Train Booking Sites for full info.

National Rail also has a future travel chart, showing the furthest date in the future you can buy advance tickets for each train firm.

Find out when cheap tickets are likely to jump in price and sell out

The Trainline has a free Price Prediction tool in its Android and iOS apps, to show you when cheap tickets are likely to rise in price or sell out.

It gives predictions for specific routes, dates and times based on data from billions of journeys, making it great for when you want a cheap advance fare but haven't finalised your plans.

We tried it on a journey from Edinburgh to London Euston - it showed tickets currently cost £33 and would likely sell out at that price in 59 days, and could hit £146 by the day of travel.

Beware when you book. If you use Trainline's Price Prediction tool, DON'T use Trainline to buy your tickets, as you could end up paying from £2.75 extra in booking and delivery fees. See below for which sites don't charge.

Split your tickets, not your journey, to save big

This is the big trick everyone should know. Instead of buying tickets for the whole journey, buying tickets for its constituent parts can, bizarrely, slash the price, even though you're on exactly the same train.

For example, if you're travelling from London to Durham, but the train calls at York you could potentially save money by buying a ticket from London to York and then York to Durham. You could even be sat in the same seat for the entire journey - you'll just have two tickets rather than one.

Crucially, TrainSplit factors in the 10% cut of your saving you'll be charged if you go on to buy via TrainSplit - so if you use TrainSplit for research then buy elsewhere, you'll actually save MORE than what you're shown.

If you use any of these tools let us know how you get on in the Split Ticketing forum discussion thread.

It normally takes 5-10 minutes to check for split tickets, but it's worth doing, especially for long journeys. Here's a step-by-step guide:

Find the journey's cheapest standard price Track down the standard price for the journey you want to make. Without it, you won't know if you can save money.

Find out where the train stops Use the National Rail site. Search for the train you want to take, click 'Details' and then 'Show calling points'.

Check the options Pick a main station along the journey you want to take and search for separate tickets to and from there for each leg - if that doesn't make the journey any cheaper, try another station.

Unfortunately our TicketySplit tool is no more, but there are other sites you can use to help - see full details above.

Once you've searched for split fares using those sites, compare the cost of any you find with that of buying the tickets yourself directly from the relevant train company/companies to check you're getting the best deal - remember to take any admin, booking, commission or postage fees into account when making your calculations.

If the train you want to catch stops at a lot of places, there'll be a huge combination of tickets available, and then splitting the fare comes down to time versus money. Splitting a journey into six or eight tickets might work out cheaper (last year a football supporter ended up with 56 tickets), but it'll take a fair amount of legwork if you're splitting the journey yourself.

A final tip If Megatrain*, which operates mainly in the East Midlands, covers part of your journey, you could bag a £1 ticket for part of it - read cheap Megatrain fares for more info.

Yes, but these can be more difficult to find as they require roughly the same route in each direction to save you money, or else you may just be offered an open return, which is unlikely to be the cheapest option.

If this is the case, split the return journey you want into two singles and search for split fares on each leg separately - just follow our step-by-step guide.

There may be a problem if you need to change trains and you're delayed before you split tickets.

For example, if you're going from London to Durham via York, and you're changing trains at York, delays that make you miss your time-specific train from York to Durham could mean you have to pay extra.

However, you could also claim compensation for the delay - see our Train Delays guide for more details.

In the rare event that you book split tickets and your split ticket stop coincides with the station where you change trains, should your first train run late, your second ticket might not be valid for the next leg of the journey.

Finally, off-peak and super off-peak tickets require you to travel at specific times of day. So if you split your tickets at a station where you have to change, and a delay takes you into peak times, you may have to pay again to travel during this time.

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Book early, late

Most people know that buying train tickets in advance is usually cheaper, but many don't realise you can often buy them right down to the wire - the golden rule is:

Always check if advance tickets are still available before you travel

If tickets haven't sold out, six firms now let you buy advance tickets on the day. Many more allow you to buy the day before, so never assume it's too late. (But make sure you have time to get your tickets as it can take up to two hours before they're ready to collect.)

Here are train firms' cut-off points for advance tickets. We update this table regularly, but policies can sometimes change in between, so always check.

Table correct as of December 2018. (1) You can save 10% by buying online. (2) 14, 30 & 90-day advance tickets available online.

Spend over £90/year? Consider a railcard

Railcards can cut a third off the bill. You buy them on the Railcard site and most are usually £30 a year or £70 for three, which works out at £23.30 a year. So, spend more than £90 a year on trains, even on just one trip, and a railcard is worth getting.

All railcards, except the Network Railcard, give you up to a third off off-peak rail and tube travel in London on either Oyster pay-as-you-go or travelcards. Just go to an underground ticket office with your railcard and either ask them to register it to your Oyster card or buy a travelcard.

Don't assume every journey's eligible for a railcard discount, always check first, especially if travelling at peak times, as the rules vary by operator.

Check out our Railcard deals page for more info and railcard discounts.

A new railcard to extend child fares to 16 and 17-year-olds will be launched in September - see the 16 & 17 Railcard MSE News story for full details.

Up to four adults (aged 16+) when travelling with up to four children (aged 5-15)

Can't be used during the weekday morning peak-period when travelling between stations in the London and south east England area. One child in your group must have a child-rate ticket for the adult discount to apply.

Can't be used for weekday morning peak-period services when travelling between stations in the London and south east England area. Times of such services can change depending on availability, so check before buying tickets.

Up to four adults (aged 16+) and up to four children (aged 5-15) travelling together.

Can't be used before 10am on weekdays, though it can be used a little earlier on some services. £13 min spend per adult and £1 min spend per child Mon-Fri.

£302

N/A

1. Some county councils offer discounts on the cost of this card, so check with yours using the Gov.uk council finder. 2. If you've a season ticket for London or south east England, you qualify for a gold card, which offers similar discounts to the Network Railcard.

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Got a season ticket for London or south east England? Get a free gold card

If you buy an annual season ticket for a route which starts and/or ends in the Network Railcard Area (effectively London and south east England), or if you buy an annual travelcard from Transport for London, you'll also get a gold card.

This gives a similar discount as a Network Railcard and also gives you a third off off-peak travel in London with an Oyster card. When you buy a qualifying season ticket, it should say 'gold card' at the bottom. Those buying an annual travelcard on their Oyster card will be given a separate gold card at the ticket office, but it's worth double-checking the discount has been added to your Oyster.

Just as with a normal railcard, you'll need to take your gold card with you to get the discount when travelling on eligible routes.

It's worth noting you can also grab a 16-25, Family & Friends, Two Together, Senior, Disabled Persons or Network Railcard for just £10, for you or someone you know if you have a gold card. See our £10 Railcard deal.

Trick to get a 16-25 Railcard until you're almost 27, and the 26-30 Railcard until you're almost 32

The 16-25 Railcard costs £30 for a year (or £70 for three), while the 26-30 Railcard costs £30 a year. They give you a third off most rail fares, and you'll also get a third off London travelcards and off-peak Oyster travel. They can be used anytime, though if you're travelling before 10am on weekdays the minimum fare after the discount is £12.

Despite its name, there's a great loophole which lets you keep on using the 16-25 Railcard even after you've turned 26. You just need to buy a three-year railcard the day before your 24th birthday (or a one-year railcard before your 26th) to get the discount almost until you turn 27.

If you're not due to renew your existing railcard, which you can do up to 30 days before expiry, there's nothing to stop you buying another 16-25 Railcard using a different email address if you want to use this trick.

This trick also works with the new 26-30 Railcard, though it's worth noting it only available as a one-year card. You can buy the 26-30 Railcard just before your 31st birthday and keep using it until its expiry date – so if you renew it at the right time, you can use it until just before you turn 32.

Have a look at our Railcard deals page to see if there are any offers available before buying one.

Regular traveller? Grab a season ticket

Regular rail users and commuters should consider annual season tickets - National Rail's Season Ticket Calculator is a nifty tool to help you work out the cost.

Some journeys can have multiple season ticket options. Check them all, as it can make a real difference. A 12-month Guildford to London season ticket including a London travelcard for zones 1-6 is £5,572, yet if you restrict your travel to the Clandon and Woking routes, it's £4,616.

Also check if there are any split ticket options, to see if you can save with two season tickets covering different legs of the journey.

Singles can beat returns

Returns should be better value, but often aren't. It's very common that cheaper fares are available by getting two single tickets rather than a return ticket, so be sure to check.

It's usually easy to find these deals online as you'll often be shown both single and return fares when booking.

Save £275 on a London to Manchester return

As an example, a search for a return between London and Manchester train brought up a standard anytime return ticket costing a whopping £332. A quick check instantly found that, for the same journey, an outbound advance single ticket was £31, while coming back it cost £26 – a total of £57 for the journey.

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Doesn't sell tickets, but highlights the cheapest fares. Links directly to train companies, most of which are fee-free.

1 Only if ticket on departure or self-print aren't available for your booking. 2 Tickets must be booked at least five working days before you travel. 3 Tickets must be booked at least seven days before you travel.

Only pay peak for the bit that is

Train peak times are usually before 10am and between 4pm and 7pm. Yet if a long train journey starts during peak time, even if a portion of it's outside peak time and you return outside peak time, you still pay peak-time price for the whole journey.

By using split ticketing based on time as well as distance, you can ensure you're only paying peak prices for the portion of your journey that actually takes place in peak hours.

How much you can save... £76 off a Ldn-Manc peak train return

As an example, on a London to Manchester return journey leaving at 8.40am and returning at 6.35pm, we found a standard return fare for £130. By splitting the ticket at Milton Keynes on the way out and Stoke-on-Trent on the return, it knocked £76 off the total fare as the majority of the journey was off peak.

Grab cheap Megatrain fares

Megatrain* flogs hundreds of singles from £6 plus a £1 booking fee, for routes between London and Chesterfield, Derby, Leicester, Loughborough, Nottingham or Sheffield.

It uses the same booking system as Megabus, but the train won't be as cheap 'n' cheerful as the tickets - as Megatrain is operated by East Midlands Trains, and you'll be on the same service as people who booked their tickets elsewhere.

While normal cheap advance tickets are released 10-12 weeks in advance, Megatrain only releases tickets 45 days before.

A crafty MoneySaving trick is to combine Megatrain fares with split ticketing.

Grab ultra-cheap train deals

There are more promotional train fares available than people realise; for ultra-cheap deals, you have to know where to look and be flexible.

Offers change all the time and include everything from Kids for a Quid on Southeastern to eight-week free first-class upgrades for expectant mothers with Greater Anglia.

5% cashback for the first 3 months on National Rail & Tfl

The American Express* Platinum Cashback Everyday card is the top fee-free card, especially if you've big spending to do in the next few months, as it has a great introductory rate, then tiered ongoing cashback. The 5% cashback covers all purchases, including spending on public transport.

To get the maximum intro cashback of £100, you need to spend £2,000 within three months.

Find cheap first-class tickets

Travelling first-class doesn't have to be costly – there are a couple of ways to grab a premium ticket for less.

If you book well ahead the difference in price between standard and first class can be less than you'd expect, depending on when you want to travel. For example, a single standard class ticket from London to York was £39 when we check 11 weeks ahead, but a first-class ticket was £44.

It can, however, sometimes be cheaper to upgrade on the day, as 11 firms offer a flat-rate upgrade fee on weekends and bank holidays.

For example if a first-class advance ticket with LNER from Leeds to London is £44, but you opt for a standard-class ticket at £18, and pay the £15 upgrade fee on the day you'll save £11.

Free drinks and light snacks (at seat service on most journeys). Wider, reclining seat with extra leg room. Table, power socket and USB port. First class lounge use at Cardiff Central and London Paddington.

Reclining seat with extra leg room. Charging points on most services. Free Wi-Fi on many services.

ScotRail

£3.60 or £6, depending on route

Free hot and cold drinks and snacks. Extra space.

South Western Railway

£5, £10 or £15, depending on route

Free Wi-Fi on majority of trains.

TransPennine Express

£10 - £15 on Scottish routes

Free drinks, pastries and biscuits on selected routes. Bigger, comfier reclining seat. Power socket, free Wi-Fi. At-seat service on most Manchester Airport-Glasgow Central/Edinburgh services, and on some others.

Virgin Trains

£10, £15, £20 or £25, depending on journey

Free snacks and drinks. Wider, comfier seat with more leg room. Table, power socket at window seats. Free Wi-Fi and entertainment service. First class lounge use at nine stations.

Table correct as of December 2018.

Warning! Travelling short: cheap but banned

Cheap advance fares are often scarce on popular routes, especially commuter ones. This means it's sometimes possible to buy a ticket for a longer journey that incorporates your route at a cheaper price and make some serious savings.

This is known as 'travelling short'. Sadly, it's a no-go as it's against the conditions of advance tickets and you can get fined for doing it.

Most other non-advance tickets allow you to get off early or break your journey – check the ticket's conditions or ask at a station.

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